


you can't go home again

by renquise



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/F, Space AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-05
Updated: 2014-01-05
Packaged: 2018-01-07 13:09:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 763
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1120190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renquise/pseuds/renquise
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The artificial gravity is down to its minimum, and Ymir’s arms feel too light, disconnected, and the fine strands of Christa’s hair that have worked themselves loose of her ponytail are floating around her face, catching the red of the screens.</p><p>(Or, Ymir and Christa in space.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can't go home again

The air is running out.

The oxygen garden went up in flames a few days ago, the green turning to a charred crisp in a matter of seconds, and it probably doesn’t even matter that they managed to heave the blast doors into place—Ymir’s hands are still blistered from the heat coming through the doors, and they chafe like hell against the rough spacesuit gloves, so she twists the gloves off and throws them to the side, because they won’t do much good now. The emergency oxygen generator is limping on its last legs, and Ymir can see the evidence of it in Christa’s shallow, panting breaths. She’s quiet, but then again, so is Ymir.

The display on the console is flashing red, and they had shut off the alarm long ago because it was driving them both nuts, but it doesn’t do a thing for the hull breaches lining the edges of the ship.

There’s just the cockpit, now. Christa set their heading to the nearest station and coaxed one last, wrenching jump out of the engine that seemed to knock half the craft loose, metal twisting and screeching.

Ymir can’t remember what fruity name the ship had before, when it was just a pleasure yacht. It now has Second Chance scrawled crookedly across its bow, and it doesn’t much resemble the fancy lines of a yacht anymore, what with all the additions they’ve bolted onto it, but it still isn’t meant to take the stress of this many jumps, or to go so far.

Christa had grabbed Ymir’s hand before the silence of the jump took them, held it tight enough to feel through their gloves. 

It might have been an easier death, but Ymir can’t help but be glad that they survived it, because she it means that she can twist Christa’s glove off her sleeve now and grab her hand again, skin to skin. The tips of Christa’s fingers are cold and clammy. Ymir flicks her eyes up to meet Christa’s, daring her to say anything. She doesn’t, but squeezes Ymir’s hand, hard enough to hurt.

The ship is drifting on inertia, now, systems powered down to almost nothing, except the barest life support and the distress beacon. They’re staying still, too, sitting against the piloting console, saving energy. The artificial gravity is down to its minimum, and Ymir’s arms feel too light, disconnected, and the fine strands of Christa’s hair that have worked themselves loose of her ponytail are floating around her face, catching the red of the screens.

They’re still two days away. And that’s if an asteroid or debris doesn’t knock them off-course.

“There might be enough for one of us to make it,” Ymir says, offhandedly. “You’re so fucking tiny that the oxygen load is minimal, anyways.”

She’s never been exposed to vacuum before, but who knows, she might not suffer all that much from it—or her alien bits wouldn’t, anyways. She’s heard of others of her kind wrapping themselves in crystal and sleeping, adrift for millions of years.

She’s used to fighting for every breath, for every moment of existence, and this—well, it wouldn’t even hurt.

Ymir looks over at Christa, and Christa looks stricken, guilty, and ha, Ymir would bet anything that it’s because it had occurred to her, too, only she would have offered herself up and left Ymir in this sorry tin can. Fat chance of that.

It only lasts a second, though, because Christa sets her jaw and punches Ymir on the arm, hard, before her arm falls back to her side and she has to catch her breath again. “Fuck no,” she says, between gasps. “Who else would be there to leave stuff all over the engine room and antagonize every ship we run across?”

If Ymir really wanted to go, Christa wouldn’t be able to do a damn thing about it. But Ymir is a selfish fuck, and if she’s going to die, she’s going to die with Christa’s hand in hers. The grin she gives back to Christa is an ugly, crooked thing, but Christa’s frown eases.

When Christa leans over, it’s more of a slow topple than anything else. Ymir catches her by the elbows, and Christa kisses her, breathing air into her lungs, her hands clutching at Ymir’s suit, Ymir’s helmet an awkward lump between them.

They’re only going to die once they’ve run as far as they can, galaxies under their heels and their lungs burning for air, falling with each step, only to let their feet catch them. 

Ymir breathes.


End file.
